At the Astana Mining and Metallurgy Congress in June, Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov said Kazakhstan wanted to become a regional hub for processing and higher-value manufacturing. That should force Ankara to revisit the mining memorandum signed in July 2025, which emphasised joint exploration and production. If bilateral co-operation ends at the mine mouth, it will already be behind Kazakhstan’s own industrial policy.
Türkiye and Kazakhstan need a processing alliance, not an ore-for-machinery bargain
Mehmet Enes Beşer.
Joint work should extend from beneficiation and metallurgy to alloys, permanent-magnet materials, processing equipment, recycling and environmental control. If Kazakhstan supplies concentrate while Türkiye imports the refined chemicals, magnets or specialised components needed by its factories from established producers elsewhere, both will remain outside the most strategic stages.
The excitement around Kazakhstan’s mineral potential makes this distinction urgent. In April 2025, the government announced an estimated rare-earth resource of more than 20 million tonnes at the Zhana Kazakhstan site, including neodymium, cerium, lanthanum and yttrium. The estimate still requires confirmation as an economically recoverable reserve. Even if confirmed, geology alone will not create industrial power. Refining concentration continued to rise in 2025 and that planned magnet production in diversified regions amounts to only about one-third of expected rare-earth mining capacity by 2035. The bottleneck is what happens after extraction.
That middle of the chain is technically demanding. Ore must be characterised, concentrated, separated and refined before it becomes high-purity metal, alloy powder or a usable component. Plants also need specialised equipment, laboratories, water treatment and reliable maintenance. These activities create engineering knowledge and supplier demand; an offtake agreement does not.
The two countries have complementary starting points, but neither should exaggerate them. Kazakhstan has operating mines, metallurgy and trained engineers. Türkiye has an export-oriented machinery industry and is developing rare-earth processing knowledge through the Beylikova pilot plant and the Rare Earth Elements Research Institute. It is not yet a substitute for the countries dominating separation, advanced magnets and specialised equipment. A credible alliance would bring in technology partners from Japan, South Korea, Europe or Southeast Asia where necessary, rather than present dependence as self-sufficiency.
The division of labour should follow industrial logic. Beneficiation and primary metallurgy will usually make more sense near Kazakh deposits, avoiding the shipment of low-grade material and retaining local value. Turkish firms can supply process machinery, power electronics, automation, precision parts and environmental systems, while Turkish industrial clusters provide demand for refined metals, alloys and magnet materials. Joint laboratories should qualify outputs for automotive, machinery, energy and electronics customers. Technology licences and engineering teams should be shared, instead of leaving one side with the mine and the other with the purchase order.
Southeast Asia makes this more than a bilateral Central Asian project. ASEAN’s Minerals Cooperation Action Plan for 2026–30 explicitly seeks upstream-to-downstream development, technology adoption and stronger human capacity. Indonesia’s nickel policy has shown that domestic processing can be created quickly, but also that foreign-led technology and excess capacity can accompany the boom. Malaysia, meanwhile, is seeking investment in environmentally responsible rare-earth processing and super-magnet production. The lesson is not to copy an export ban, but to build capabilities that can enter several regional supply chains without allowing one foreign operator or market to control them.
A Türkiye–Kazakhstan alliance could serve those chains selectively. Kazakh tungsten processed into hard-metal powders and Turkish cutting tools could supply machinery users in Thailand, Viet Nam and Malaysia. Rare-earth materials, once commercially proven, could support motor and electronics production, while recycling partnerships with ASEAN firms recover magnets and metals from end-of-life equipment. This would offer Southeast Asian manufacturers another supplier relationship without pretending that Kazakhstan or Türkiye can replace China across the whole chain.
Environmental rules must be part of the commercial model. Mineral separation can consume substantial energy and water and generate hazardous residues; weak oversight would turn strategic ambition into a local pollution problem. Each project should publish water and emissions baselines, tailings plans, closure finance and traceability data. Recycling should begin before large waste volumes arrive. The IEA expects secondary supply’s contribution to key energy minerals to rise from roughly 10 per cent today towards 20 percent by 2040, but only if collection and recovery systems are built beforehand.
The strongest objection is cost. New refining projects outside dominant suppliers face higher capital expenditure, scarce equipment and uncertain prices. The IEA estimates capital costs can be 20 to more than 150 percent higher, with operating costs around 50 per cent higher on average. A complete national value chain is therefore unrealistic. A selective bilateral chain is not: it should focus on products with confirmed deposits, contracted buyers and a credible technology route.
Ankara and Astana should establish a Türkiye–Kazakhstan Critical Minerals Processing Alliance under their High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council. Its first portfolio should test three projects: a tungsten-to-tooling line; a rare-earth separation and magnet-material pilot contingent on verified ore economics; and a platform for recovering valuable metals from metallurgical waste, used equipment and electronic scrap. A joint project-preparation facility should complete technical studies, environmental assessments and offtake negotiations before public finance is committed.
Support should be released against measurable outcomes: qualified local suppliers, engineers trained, recovery rates achieved, water reused, process knowledge shared and sales to third markets. Extraction-only projects should not receive strategic incentives. ASEAN buyers and technology firms should be invited into selected projects, while Kazakhstan and Türkiye retain diversified ownership, transparent procurement and access to operational data.
A mining agreement can secure tonnes. A processing alliance secures competence. If ore leaves Kazakhstan while Turkish factories continue buying the decisive materials and technologies from dominant refiners, the partnership will merely rearrange the route of dependency. It becomes strategic only when Kazakh resources, Turkish industrial capability and external technology produce materials that factories in Europe and Southeast Asia buy repeatedly.
The author is Mehmet Enes Beşer, a researcher focusing on ASEAN, and a graduate of Sociology in Boğaziçi University. He is the ASEAN Coordinator at Vatan Party (Türkiye) and a member of the Editorial Board of Teori magazine.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of The Astana Times.
